y, when he would. Rarely has a foreign envoy at
any court, at any period of history, enjoyed such privileges of being
useful to his government. And there is no doubt that the services of
Aerssens had been most valuable to his country, notwithstanding his
constant care to increase his private fortune through his public
opportunities. He was always ready to be useful to Henry likewise. When
that monarch same time before the truce, and occasionally during the
preliminary negotiations for it, had formed a design to make himself
sovereign of the Provinces, it was Aerssens who charged himself with the
scheme, and would have furthered it with all his might, had the project
not met with opposition both from the Advocate and the Stadholder.
Subsequently it appeared probable that Maurice would not object to the
sovereignty himself, and the Ambassador in Paris, with the King's
consent, was not likely to prove himself hostile to the Prince's
ambition.

"There is but this means alone," wrote Jeannini to Villeroy, "that can
content him, although hitherto he has done like the rowers, who never
look toward the place whither they wish to go." The attempt of the Prince
to sound Barneveld on this subject through the Princess-Dowager has
already been mentioned, and has much intrinsic probability.
Thenceforward, the republican form of government, the municipal
oligarchies, began to consolidate their power. Yet although the people as
such were not sovereigns, but subjects, and rarely spoken of by the
aristocratic magistrates save with a gentle and patronizing disdain, they
enjoyed a larger liberty than was known anywhere else in the world.
Buzenval was astonished at the "infinite and almost unbridled freedom"
which he witnessed there during his embassy, and which seemed to him
however "without peril to the state."

The extraordinary means possessed by Aerssens to be important and useful
vanished with the King's death. His secret despatches, painting in sombre
and sarcastic colours the actual condition of affairs at the French
court, were sent back in copy to the French court itself. It was not
known who had played the Ambassador this vilest of tricks, but it was
done during an illness of Barneveld, and without his knowledge. Early in
the year 1613 Aerssens resolved, not to take his final departure, but to
go home on leave of absence. His private intention was to look for some
substantial office of honour and profit at home. Failing of this,